Maligned Tigers bullpen does the job in Game One

Saturday

Oct 12, 2013 at 11:49 PM

BOSTON — When Jim Leyland declared before the game that “I think this will be a starting pitching series,” it sounded a lot like wishful thinking.Leyland was going to run out four of the game’s best starting...

Brian MacPherson Journal Sports Writer brianmacp

BOSTON — When Jim Leyland declared before the game that “I think this will be a starting pitching series,” it sounded a lot like wishful thinking.

Leyland was going to run out four of the game’s best starting pitchers in the American League Championship Series — including Anibal Sanchez, who struck out 12 and didn’t allow a hit in six innings on Saturday night — but his bullpen looked like his team’s biggest vulnerability. Detroit relievers posted a 4.01 ERA this season, fourth-worst in the American League, better only than non-playoff teams Houston, Los Angeles and Seattle.

(Those numbers certainly were inflated by deposed closer Jose Valverde, who posted a 5.59 ERA in 20 appearances before he was designated for assignment in June and released in August.)

It might still turn out to be a vulnerability. The series is young yet.

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But Al Alburquerque, Jose Veras, Drew Smyly and Joaquin Benoit combined to throw three scoreless innings behind Sanchez, stymieing a Red Sox lineup so many expected to come to life in the late innings. They blew the no-hitter — Benoit gave up a line-drive single to Daniel Nava with one out in the ninth inning — but they finished out the shutout.

The sight of Alburquerque coming into the game in the seventh inning should have been a sign the Boston bats were about to come to life. Alburquerque had a 4.59 ERA and walked 34 hitters in 49 innings pitched in the regular season, and he gave up two hits and was charged with an earned run in the only appearance he made in the ALDS against Oakland.

With Sanchez out of the game, John Farrell sent up Mike Carp and Jarrod Saltalamacchia to pinch-hit for Will Middlebrooks and David Ross. Carp swung at a slider on his hands and grounded out weakly to shortstop. Saltalamacchia struck out looking at a fastball — a fastball he perhaps didn’t expect given the frequency with which Alburquerque throws his slider.

An inning later, Veras — a trade-deadline acquisition added to fortify what had been a shaky bullpen — struck out Shane Victorino and Dustin Pedroia, a reversion to the strikeout-an-inning stuff he flashed while bouncing from Florida to Pittsburgh to Milwaukee to Houston over the last four seasons.

Benoit struck out 36 hitters in 352/3 innings after he replaced Valverde in the middle of the season. He gave up a two-run single to Yoenis Cespedes in Game Four of the ALDS, but he had a cushion to work with in that game, and it didn’t prove costly.

Called upon on Saturday, Benoit struck out Mike Napoli looking at a slider before Nava averted history with his single. Benoit got Stephen Drew to fly to medium right field, and then he got Xander Bogaerts to pop to shortstop to end the game.

“It would have been nice,” Benoit said after the game, about the possibility of a combined no-hitter, “but we’ll take the win.”